Thursday, April 13, 2006

Law School Timeline

1784-The first law school in the United States opens. Soon after, the first gunner appears, commencing two-plus centuries of eye rolling.

1786- Several competing law schools open.

1788- Colonial News and Flat World Reports releases it’s first official law school rankings. Five schools are included. Students at the top two ranked schools mercilessly tease the students at the three lowest ranked schools, while the lower ranked schools tout their research and writing programs.

1795- Ezekiel Miller, a recent graduate of Harvard, has an idea to open a law school for more dimwitted students. This fledgling school produced numerous graduates, none of which were sought by employers. His school went bankrupt a few years later, but became the forefather of modern fourth tier schools.

1808- The first ever law school grading curve is introduced after all nine members of the 1L class at Harvard receive straight A’s, and rival schools complain of grade inflation. However, employers still prefer the three lowest ranked Harvard grads over those from other schools.

1823- Phineas McCloud, a 2L at Columbia, arrives late to class wearing the casual top hat instead of the more formal powdered wig. No one comments. The next day Phineas arrives in pajama pants and a sweatshirt.

1841- Our nation’s greatest citizen, Abraham Lincoln, proves the importance of law school in shaping great minds by becoming an attorney without ever having gone to law school.

1854- Ramrod College in New York City holds the first ever “law school box social dance”, a precursor to law prom. However, since there were no female law students at the time, it was wrongly interpreted to be for homosexuals, and the school quickly closed down and reopened a year later as the nation’s first gay dance club.

1865- The Civil War ends, leaving 560,000 dead. The actual number of dead was 560,778, but those additional 778 were attorneys, and were not counted amongst the casualties, since they wouldn’t really be missed.

1879- A partner at a large Boston law firm overhears two Irish immigrants speaking about a local prize fighter named Billy Boy Howard. The partner has an epiphany about how to charge clients and keep track of his associate’s work: Billable hours. The sensation sweeps law firms nationwide.

1880- Attorneys everywhere begin to hate their jobs.

1886- At Boston College, a student visited Dean Henry Banks in the hopes that Dean Banks could help him find employment. The Dean hemmed and hawed and was unable to give any sound advice other than "put thyself out there". Historians would later regard this encounter as the birth of career services.

1896- James Mitchell, a 1L at Yale, inspired by a “horseless carriage,” puts wheels on a suitcase and begins to carry his heavy books in the loud, cumbersome apparatus. James immediately becomes the butt of his classmate’s jokes.

1898- Ethyl Morris becomes the nation’s first ever female law student. Coincidentally, she becomes the first female law student to complain about not being able to find a man despite wearing numerous alluring bustles.

1911- Brandon Sterling, a 1L at Penn, publishes a pamphlet of law school observations and stories called “Sterling’s Musings on Law and the Modern Life”. It serves as a precursor to the “blawg boom” a century later, where one half of all law students maintained a weblog.

1923- Adam Stephens, a 1L at Michigan, receives a B+ grade in contracts despite rarely attending class or reading the assigned material, proving that you can succeed in law school without endless hours of toil. This unheralded hero is considered by many to be the Jackie Robinson of law school slacking.

1927- James Washington becomes the first African-American to attend law school, when he enrolls at Loyola University in Chicago. He founds the first ever Black Law Student Association, but disbands it when he realized he would always have to be the one sitting at the table selling exam survival kits.

1938- The ballpoint pen is invented, making it much easier for law students to take notes.

1940- Thomas Schmidt, a professor at Duke, bans ballpoint pens from class because he feels that because students are so busy writing clear and concise notes without the worry of ink smearing or the quill breaking that they can’t think and analyze what he’s telling them.

1949- The American Bar Association, during its annual meeting, votes nearly unanimously to change how law school is run. A declaration read: “Whereas, law school up until this point in time has been hands on and teaches the students how to actually practice law, we find this course of study to make too much sense. Therefore, it is the opinion of this panel that hereafter law school should focus on the arcane, obtuse, and impractical, and shall at no time attempt to prepare its students for life after law school.”

1954- The McCarthy hearings introduce young attorney Roy Cohn to the country. Evil children are inspired to opportunistically betray their nation. Law school applications rise, subsequently.

1968- A Time Magazine report on the effects of the rising counter-culture in our nation’s educational system reports that while free love and drug experimentation run rampant on college campuses, law students have largely been unaffected and are still “quite square”.

1976- On the last day of Professor Ronald Dixon’s Property class at Pepperdine University, frustrated students sarcastically applaud their terrible professor. Misinterpreting this as a sign of respect, other classes begin applauding their professors, a misguided tradition which swept law schools across the nation.

1988- The first Scalia opinions begin to creep into casebooks. A generation of sexually frustrated nerds, perpetually confused by women’s mixed signals, find a "straight talking" comrade.

1994- Westlaw introduces its online database of case law, rendering literally millions upon millions of books useless. Heroically, legal writing professors try to carry the torch for book research, a practice as useful as teaching children to use an 8-track.

1995- People everywhere rejoice as Microsoft Windows includes games such as solitaire in its operating system, giving law students everywhere something to do during class instead of take notes.

1999- At the University of Pittsburgh, a hard fought election campaign for SBA Vice President between Katie Campbell and Todd Spencer causes riots when the results are announced. Evidence comes forth that Spencer bribed the Asian Law Society, among other groups, to vote for him. An emergency meeting of the ABA produces a mandate that all future law school elections should follow the standard high school election procedure, complete with glittery posters and hopelessly unrealistic campaign promises.

2002-Andrew Barbino and Sarah Prince, both 1Ls at Iowa, engage in an epic duel during their oral argument. Prince spoke for 13 seconds before being interrupted by a question, at which point she froze up and did not say another word for the rest of her allotted time. Barbino seized the opportunity by stammering through a rehearsed speech, ignoring judge’s questions and keeping his eyes glued to his paper. However, due to the dearth of quality candidates, both were invited to join moot court.

2006- I am literally so bored that I sat down to write a fake timeline of law school events.